Who's your favorite author?

[desertgrandma]

Originally Posted by basschick

neil gaiman
mark helprin
michelle west (don't enjoy her books as much when she's writing as michelle sagara)

I just checked out a couple of Neil Gaiman's from the library.....he was recommended by a friend. Hope I like him as much as I expect to! Checking out books from new authors from the library is a great way to see if I want to 'invest' in them! Which is your favorite book of his?

[bbusybookworm]

Originally Posted by desertgrandma

I just checked out a couple of Neil Gaiman's from the library.....he was recommended by a friend. Hope I like him as much as I expect to! Checking out books from new authors from the library is a great way to see if I want to 'invest' in them! Which is your favorite book of his?

If you haven't already, check out his Sandman series. Even though it is a comic book series, the Plot and art are great and really showcase his talent.

And as for the Favourite book, Has to be Good Omens, the book he co wrote with Terry Pratchett. Whole I've only read a couple of his other books, such as American Gods, Omens, is still my favourite, as it is written by two excellent authors.

[pshrynk]

Originally Posted by desertgrandma

I just checked out a couple of Neil Gaiman's from the library.....he was recommended by a friend. Hope I like him as much as I expect to! Checking out books from new authors from the library is a great way to see if I want to 'invest' in them! Which is your favorite book of his?

For the best treat of your young life, get the UK version of Pratchet/Gaiman's Good Omens. US version is, for some reason, dumbed down on the jokes. Not yet availabel in e-book, but well worth the coin for ordering from Amazon.co.uk and reading the p-book version.

[DixieGal]

I used to really love Zelazney. (Probably spelled wrong)

[desertgrandma]

Originally Posted by pshrynk

For the best treat of your young life, get the UK version of Pratchet/Gaiman's Good Omens. US version is, for some reason, dumbed down on the jokes. Not yet availabel in e-book, but well worth the coin for ordering from Amazon.co.uk and reading the p-book version.

"Young" life?? Bless you my child. Thanks for the 'heads up" from both busybookworm and pshrynk.......

[montsnmags]

Originally Posted by DixieGal

I used to really love Zelazney. (Probably spelled wrong)

Roger Zelazny? Lord of Light is a recent read (as in, I read it in the last 18 months or so), and I thoroughly enjoyed it. It definitely hit the "Favourites" category. The only reason I haven't started on more of his is because I haven't found a spot to fit them in yet (TBR pile...you know how it is).

Cheers,
Marc

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by montsnmags

Roger Zelazny? Lord of Light is a recent read (as in, I read it in the last 18 months or so), and I thoroughly enjoyed it. It definitely hit the "Favourites" category. The only reason I haven't started on more of his is because I haven't found a spot to fit them in yet (TBR pile...you know how it is).

_Lord of Light_ is splendid. It won the 1968 Hugo Award for Best Novel, and is a good representation of Roger's strengths as a writer. He was a superb stylist, and tended to mine myth for materials.

Roger is probably best known for the Amber series -- two series of five books each about the land of Amber and its inhabitants. Amber is the real world, and the city of Amber is the true city All other worlds are reflections of Amber in Shadow. The royal family of Amber have the ability to travel through Shadow, selectively adding and subtracting bits as they "hell ride", till they reach a Shadow that matches their imagining. (It's a minor philosophical question among them as to whether the worlds they travel to already exist, or are created by their efforts to reach them.)

In the first book, Corwin awakens in a hospital on Earth, with no memory of who and what he as. As events progress, we discover he is a Prince of Amber, son of Oberon, the King of Amber. Oberon has disappeared, and a dynastic struggle has broken out within the family over who will replace him. Meanwhile, Amber is under attack by strange beings out of Shadow. Corwin must somehow return to Amber despite the efforts of some of the family to prevent it, and walk the Pattern beneath the royal palace to regain his full memories and abilities, help defeat the forces of Shadow, and perhaps become the new king.

The second series concerns Corey, Corwin's son by a Princess of Chaos, who has become a computer engineer on earth, and constructed a device called Ghostwheel that can scan and map Shadow, leading to encounters with a variety of folks from both Amber and Chaos who wish to gain control of or destroy the device.

Zelazny's poetic style gets full reign in the series, and he's adept at peeling the layers of the onion and revealing that things aren't what you thought they were as the story progresses.

Zelazny might be greatest in shorter lengths. I'm fond of "For a Breath I Tarry", "The Doors of His Face, the Lamps of His Mouth", and "Damnation Alley" (later padded to novel length and made into a bad film). For a change of pace, look at _Creatures of Light and Darkness_, published after _Lord of Light_. It's another romp through myth, though with Egyptian gods this time. It got championed as a leading example of the "New Wave" in SF, which amused Roger. He'd written it mostly as a literary joke, tossing in every radical writing technique he knew to see what would happen, and was startled at the reception it got from SF fans.

I asked him once whether he had any idea when writing the Amber books that they would be regarded as his magnum opus, and he said no. He felt he had more work equal to or greater than that waiting to be written. Unfortunately, that was largely not to be: he died of liver cancer in 1995.
______
Dennis

[DixieGal]

The "Amber" books have a special place in my heart. When we were poor and dating, our special thing was to pack up the telescope, drive out ot the country where it was dark, and picnic in the car. We would look at the stars, make out, and take turns reading to each other. It was so romantic!

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by DixieGal

The "Amber" books have a special place in my heart. When we were poor and dating, our special thing was to pack up the telescope, drive out ot the country where it was dark, and picnic in the car. We would look at the stars, make out, and take turns reading to each other. It was so romantic!

I think Roger might have been pleased by that.

I knew folks back when who were members of an Amber Society, and identified with one or the other of the characters. I remember talking ot one at a convention whose character had just been killed off in the latest book. "I've never been dead before..." He wasn't quite sure how to handle it.
______
Dennis

[DixieGal]

I'll bet!

[basschick]

my favorites are neverwhere and stardust

which ones did you check out?

Originally Posted by desertgrandma

I just checked out a couple of Neil Gaiman's from the library.....he was recommended by a friend. Hope I like him as much as I expect to! Checking out books from new authors from the library is a great way to see if I want to 'invest' in them! Which is your favorite book of his?

[GeoffC]

Originally Posted by vivaldirules

Of all the authors past and present, I have to say the one who was most masterful at turning a phrase, at constructing plots that uniquely melded with themes that probe the mind, at creating vivid imagery where there was none, at establishing subtle textural threads that......well......oh, hell. He did none of that. But I find the books by James Herriot (the pen name of James Alfred Wight) to be utterly delightful. I can't think of a better word for it. The first book in his series, All Creatures Great and Small, is the only book I've read more than three times and I've read it six times to date and will again. Why? I love his simple, humorous, good-natured stories about interesting people who are different from me but who are personally very appealing.

The BBC production, by the way, was an incredibly comforting thing for me as I watched the first season (delayed a year or so before being broadcast on PBS in the U.S.) in the fall of 1979 on my 13" black-and-white while in my first year of graduate school. I was far from home, isolated from people I knew, and studying hard. Sunday evenings were gold for that one hour for me. No doubt that contributes significantly to my fondness for the books.

Brilliant...a fellow fan, at last...

G.
(I love the description of countryman walking the pavement in a large town; I always think of it when I do the same - big steps 'n' little steps)...

[vivaldirules]

"Ah nobbut went once to Brawton and that was enough. Ah couldn't walk on t'street!"

"Couldn't walk?"

"Nay. There were that many people about. I 'ad to take big steps and little 'uns, then big steps and little 'uns again. Couldn't get goin'."

[pshrynk]

Are they in e-book? I'm too lazy right now to search, but I love those books!

[GeoffC]

Originally Posted by pshrynk

Are they in e-book? I'm too lazy right now to search, but I love those books!

Not that I have found them; but you never know...